Jada Lee Symone
This audio documentary was created during the Coronavirus pandemic over the summer of 2020. As a graduate student in documentary expression, I felt that working in the field and interviewing people in their homes was unsafe. This project was produced out of my desire to keep doing fieldwork by any means possible, even if that meant going remote. This interview was conducted over Zoom, and my interviewee, Jada Lee Symone, recorded the conversation on her iPhone voice memo app.
Born and raised in Columbus, Mississippi, Mississippi drag queen Jada Lee Symone takes us on the adventure and allows us to walk in her shoes to help us understand what it is like for an LGBTQ person to grow up in the South during their most formative years. From a very young age, she's been interested in makeup and creating different looks, and as someone who knew she was different right off the bat, theater helped bring out her voice and her confidence.
Jada also speaks on Southern pageantry drag, and how it is an aesthetic that she feels like is exclusively in the South.
